Tag Archives: Non-doing

Life is action in relationship. At present we are acting with drive of desire with an end in view.So desire will be free of end in view if it is not empirical,selfish, in the service of “me” and “mine”. We always seek a result from action. We don’t do any action without a reward. It is our habit.But that habit results in formation of “actor”, “doer”, “me”, “ego”.So action seeking a reward can never produce stillness of mind. On the contrary it results in more thoughts, more thought burden on mind. Such mind can never be free of its contents, such action cannot help in emptying of mind.Once a group of scholors met Sri Ramana Maharshi and asked “what is action without an end in view” (Nishkama Karma). Instead of replying Ramana Maharshi uprooted a spiky plant and with the help of leaves he made it into a beautiful stick which took six hours. One shepard lost his stich and looking for a new one. Ramana Maharshi gave the new stick to him.This is spontaneous action without an end in view.Scholors understood his existential message. In such action there is no “doer”, only “doing” is there. There is bondage due to action because no “doer” is born out of such action. So the action is “complete”.In action with an end in view. action will always be incomplete.

We know only conditioned action.Conditioning is old and so action is arising from the old. The translates the “new” and modify it.But interval between thoughts is always “new” and cannot modify the old. This does not mean that the “new” is exclusive. It is a state of deepening experience and so constant regeneration and is in constant revolution.It meets the problem anew,it meets the old without contaminated by it. This “new” is always moving and transforms everything it meets. The “new” goes on extending and old disappears by itself. There is no need to condemn, avoid or supress it.So thought arising in the interval disappears.

The interval between two thoughts gives the mind greater capacity to deal with any thought that may arise in the interval. The interval has vitality without any identification, condemnation, justification, interpretation.So self-inquiry is possible and easy in the presence of still mind with this interval.We should go on doing self-inquiry till such a time, this thought-free state becomes natural to us. Then we can tackle any problem in daily life “anew”.
In that state there is no sensation because sensation is thought process is verbal.What we are doing is that we are naming the living processes like fear, greed, anger, violence and creating their opposites and we are always involved in thought process trying to correct these energy leaking degenerating factors. Thought cannot do anything with a living process.If it understands this it will subside by itself. This subsidence of thought paves the way for “insight” of whole network of psychological problem which flowers in passive awareness of still mind, tells its story in detail and withers away. There is no need to “do” anything in psychological arena. So in psychological arena “insightful perception” is enough. Here non-doing is action. Self-inquiry is the way for it.